The second rum by Swell de Spirits I had at Hi Stranger hails from a distillery that has really grown on me over the recent years, and is best known to me for crafting a rum that ranks among my personal favourites — and that distillery is Rhum Isautier from Réunion Island. Now Isautier is the oldest but smallest distillery on Réunion, founded in 1845 by two brothers, Louis and Charles Isautier, travelling from France on a four-month voyage before arriving on the island. 180 years later, Isautier remains family-owned and is now managed by the 7th generation of the family.
A practice that appears to be rather unique to at least two of the three distilleries on Réunion Island, Isautier and Savanna, is how they do not confine themselves to only producing one singular style of rum, traditional (molasses) or agricole (sugarcane juice). Instead, they embrace the diversity of rum production, refining their processes to produce the best of both worlds. In her interview with the The Rum Cast, Marie Ferrand, cellar master of Isautier, goes further to explain that Isautier first distilled agricole rums at its infancy, before expanding into traditional rum production when the sugar industry rapidly grew in Réunion Island when the French lost their former colonies in Mauritius and Haiti.
There are a number of differences when it comes to producing agricoles and traditional rums at Isautier. For the agricoles, the fresh canes are sourced from the nearby farms, which are then crushed and fermented in open vats for 35 hours to produce a wash of 10% ABV, while its traditional rums are fermented for 24 hours in similar open vats to a slightly lower ABV of 8%. The rums are then distilled on a traditional multi-column, consisting of a stripping column and a rectifier, to produce a new make of 72% ABV for the agricoles, and 89% ABV for traditional rums.
Isautier too has a rather unique maturation process of allowing the undiluted new-make to age in virgin French oak barrels for a period of 6-14 months, which Marie shares that the agricoles tend to take in the flavours from the cask much quicker than the molasses rums, which explains why they are often taken out of the casks much sooner as compared to the molasses rums. These French oak barrels are also uniquely crafted by two French cooperages in mainland France, and toasted to a specific char profile set out by Isautier. The rums are then aged further in either ex-cognac or ex-Isautier rum barrels, limiting the amount of interaction with wood and instead allowing the rums to gradually mature and soften with age.
Now back to this particular Isautier bottling by Swell, it is a 12-year-old rhum agricole bearing the RVA mark, though that to me is quite a mystery as I have not been able to uncover any information on Isautier’s distillation marks, distilled in 2011 and tropically aged primarily in ex-cognac casks till January 2024, producing 316 bottles at 59.4% ABV.
The nose was delightfully complex, exuding intense caramel notes, along with a light grassiness and citrus from the beginning. But when it opens, it reveals one of the most interesting ranges of notes in rum I have come across, because the savouriness in it reminded me of a warm, wood-fire-baked pizza, topped with ham, button mushrooms, and the distinct sweetness of lightly charred green peppers. Yet there too was a touch of industrial-ness in the rum, with a hint of burnt rubber.
The palate then was rather different from before, but equally unctuous and complex in every way. It was immensely candy-like, sweet, creamy, with just the right amount of herbaceous notes or grassiness that I like in a rhum agricole. It is then followed by that very unique flavour of chinotto oranges and red hawthorn flakes, a nice bit of tannins to add to the already complex mouthfeel. In the finish, elements of sweetness return, although this time in the form of cherry-flavoured cough syrup, which was neither harsh nor artificial, that lingered in the long finish, paired with subtle hints of wood.
The rhum agricoles from Isautier have consistently been a delight to me, and Swell’s bottling is no exception. Their remarkable skill in crafting an agricole of such intensity and complexity evokes the style of Caribbean rhum agricoles from decades before. It is thus my hope that, with the assistance of independent bottlers such as Swell, the rums from Isautier will be met with great éclat.
Your occasional rum addict!
